


To the Ends of the Earth

by ShowMeAHero



Category: Captain America - All Media Types, Marvel
Genre: Angst, Civil War (Marvel), Grief/Mourning, M/M, Panic Attacks, Tragedy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-26
Updated: 2015-05-26
Packaged: 2018-04-01 07:49:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,133
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4011679
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ShowMeAHero/pseuds/ShowMeAHero
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Steve didn't deserve this.</p>
            </blockquote>





	To the Ends of the Earth

**Author's Note:**

> This is my MCU-compliant take on Steve Rogers' death in Civil War.

The trial of Bucky Barnes was painstaking, revelatory, and painful like a blade. Bucky had no idea how to handle it, how to learn all of these terrible things that he had done when he was no longer the man who had done them. To see his own face in the newspapers, declaring him a murderer, a renegade, a traitor of the United States - it was horrible. He felt like he deserved it. Steve didn’t, though. Steve didn’t deserve this.

“I’ll be there as soon as I can,” Steve promised him that morning, the morning of the jury’s decision. He made Bucky banana nut pancakes and kissed him for an hour.

“Come with me,” Bucky pleaded, hesitant, still adjusting to asking for things for himself. Steve pushed him down in his kitchen chair, straddling his lap and streaming his hands through Bucky’s hair.

“You know we have to go separately,” Steve reminded him, sucking a mark into Bucky’s neck, where the collar of his suit would hide it. “Tony is still angry. They’re going to bring me up on my own charges.” Steve pressed his nose into the space behind Bucky’s ear. “It’s going to be okay. You know it’s going to be okay.”

“I’ve done a lot of bad things, Steve,” Bucky murmured, and Steve dropped his forehead against Bucky’s. His fingertips traced Bucky’s face.

“They know it wasn’t you.” Steve’s thumbs traced Bucky’s cheekbones. Bucky exhaled shakily. Steve was heavy on his lap, pressing instinctively close to him. “Nobody likes HYDRA right now. They know it wasn’t you. It’s going to be okay.”

“Promise you’ll be there,” Bucky asked, and Steve nodded, moving both of their heads.

“You’re my best friend,” Steve answered. “Of course I’ll be there.”

Bucky lost everything when he was the Winter Soldier. He got to come back home. He learned from Natasha that you don’t have to be what HYDRA and the Red Room make you. He learned that he wasn’t who he was, and he wasn’t the Asset. He was himself. He got Steve back when he got himself back, and it was like drowning, drowning and struggling to swim and not knowing which way was up. It was like breaking the surface just when you started to black out. Steve was like breathing.

“I love you,” Bucky promised.

“I love you,” Steve vowed.

Bucky was in court, sitting beside the best lawyer he and Steve could get, and Steve wasn’t there. Tony Stark was there, looking shockingly like his father. Natasha was there, alternating between watching Bucky and watching the door. Clint Barton was there, a friend of Steve’s and now a friend of Bucky’s, who had also been brainwashed and liked to spar with Bucky as much as he liked to drag him around New York to delis. Sam Wilson was there, one of Steve’s closest friends, and he kept waving at Bucky. It seemed as though everyone Bucky had met since his reintegration was there.

Except Steve.

“I’m sorry, Mr. Barnes, but we’re going to have to begin,” the judge told him, and Bucky nodded once, stiffly. His chest was cold. Steve would never miss this. Steve would never break his promise.

Bucky’s sentencing was forgiving. Midway through, they heard a _bang_ outside, followed by a series of four smaller _bang_ s. An officer told them it was a car backfiring. Bucky’s veins were ice. He was forgiven for his crimes. Steve wasn’t there. Natasha got a call and left before Bucky did. Steve wasn’t there. Bucky got taken out the back of the courthouse, smuggled out under Clint’s coat to their cars. Steve wasn’t there. There were a bunch of cop cars and a tipped-over motorcycle in front of the courthouse.

Bucky was instructed to drive right home. Clint and Natasha were meeting him there. There were cop cars and reporters and news vans everywhere, and Bucky went in through the back entrance of his and Steve’s apartment when Clint texted him to do so. He got into the house and sat himself in Steve’s armchair in the living room. Clint was only two minutes behind him.

“Why are there so many?” Bucky asked, the second Clint came in the back door. Clint shook his head and sat down on the sofa, his head in his hands. Bucky’s stomach was lead; his chest was helium. “Why are there so many people, Clint?”

“Nat will be here any minute now,” Clint said, over and over. “Nat will be here any minute now. She’ll know what to do.”

Bucky reached for his phone at one point. Clint stood and took it from him in a heartbeat, throwing it across the room. It shattered against the far wall. Bucky stared at him. Clint fell back down onto the sofa, his head pressed to his knees. Bucky stood, just to give himself something to do. He made a pot of coffee and dumped it in the sink. He made a second pot of coffee. Natasha came.

“Sit down,” Natasha ordered, her eyes rimmed in faint red. Bucky fell into the kitchen chair he had eaten his pancakes in that morning. He could feel Steve’s weight on him, aching like a phantom limb.

“Where is he?” Bucky asked, and Natasha stood across from him at the table. Bucky swallowed. His eyes were dry. His chest was hollow. His mouth was packed with ash. “Natasha-”

“He’s dead.” Natasha leaned against the counter, her head in her hands. “He’s dead.”

Bucky’s ears were ringing like twin gunshots exploded next to his ears. Natasha’s mouth was still moving. Clint was sitting on the floor by the refrigerator, his back pressed up against the wall, his forehead shoved against his thighs. Bucky couldn’t see. Sunspots were flaring up in his eyes, and white noise filled his head. He felt like he was full of cotton for a minute before he started to fill with fire. He could feel a grenade sitting like a rock in his stomach before he pulled the pin, and a scream tore its way out of his throat.

Bucky forced his head into his hands and tore at his hair for something to feel. He came back into himself, and he could hear himself screaming, and Clint was pulling him over to the kitchen sink. Steve’s mug was still sitting in the corner of the sink. Bucky vomited down the drain. Clint splashed his face with cold water, and Bucky couldn’t stop jerking away from him.

“What happened?” Bucky asked, and his words were harsh and grating. His throat was raw and torn. He fell to the ground. Natasha’s hands started pulling through his hair, nails just the wrong side of too rough, fingers tugging just the wrong side of too hard, trying to keep him with her.

“Steve was followed by Brock Rumlow. He tried to shake him. He failed. Rumlow shot him outside the courthouse,” Natasha told him, and all Bucky could see was Brock Rumlow’s face. “It was an assassination attempt. This shot didn’t kill him. A man we thought was working for us brainwashed Agent 13, Sharon Carter.” Bucky’s head snapped up. Natasha’s hold on him tightened.

“Peggy’s niece.” Bucky tipped his head back against the cabinet beneath the sink. “Peggy’s niece.”

“Agent 13 was manipulated to assassinate him,” Natasha told him. “It’s not her fault.”

“Steve is dead,” Bucky said. Clint punched his fist through the kitchen wall. “She killed Steve-”

“Steve was taken to a hospital,” Natasha continued. “And he died.”

Bucky pushed Natasha away from him and shoved himself off the floor. He stood shakily. “Take me to the hospital.”

“James-”

 _“Take me to the hospital,”_ Bucky repeated, and his breaths were too fast, catching in his throat and hitching in his lungs. His head throbbed. His hands burned. “I need to see him. I need to see him. I need to see Steve-”

“I’ll take you, James, I’ll take you, calm down,” Natasha told him, and Bucky rested his head against the refrigerator door. His heart was racing in his chest, pulsating against his bones. He pressed his palm flat over his heart. The back of his throat was thick. His vision started to blur, blacking out and spinning together, his head feeling suddenly light and detached from the rest of him, far away from his body, far away from the feel of the refrigerator under his forehead and the linoleum beneath his feet. His palms were numb, his fingertips were tingling, his hands were unfeeling past his wrists.

“James-” Natasha said, somewhere far away. Bucky felt cold all over, drenched in ice, like he was being frozen again, getting put away and left for dead. He didn’t remember who he was. He couldn’t think. He couldn’t breathe. His hand clutched at his chest, his breathing fast and short, his chest gnawing, anguished and rotten. He struggled for a deep breath, for his own body, and Natasha slapped him across the face.

“Bucky!” Clint shouted, and Bucky stared at him. Clint spoke, but Steve’s voice rang in his ears. “We’re taking you to see Steve. Okay?” We’re going to take you to see Steve.”

Bucky couldn’t see anything. He could barely hear them. He let them lead them to the car again. Steve’s motorcycle wasn’t in the driveway. Steve wasn’t in the house. Steve wasn’t at work. Steve wasn’t at the grocery store. Steve was dead. Steve was never going to come home again. Steve was never going to use his mug, sitting dirty in the sink, ever again.

Natasha got them to the hospital in record time. Or maybe she didn’t, maybe she took two months to drive them there and Bucky didn’t notice. He noticed getting led out of the car, Clint’s hand on the small of his back, Natasha walking in front of them like a battering ram. Bucky’s vision was white at the edges.

Bucky had protected Steve since they were toddlers. Bucky had cleaned the scrapes on Steve’s knees. Bucky had thrown guys off of Steve in alleyways. Bucky had followed Steve into war. Bucky had taken bullets for Steve. Bucky died for Steve. Bucky came back for Steve. Bucky loved Steve, and Bucky protected Steve, and Bucky failed. He failed in his most important mission. Bucky failed. Bucky let Steve die.

“What’s wrong with him?” Bucky heard Natasha whispering to Sam Wilson, and he pulled away from Clint, elbowed his way past Natasha, and there was Steve.

“He’s little again,” Bucky said. “Why is he little again?”

“We don’t know,” one of the SHIELD nurses answered. “We’re still trying to-”

“He’s little again,” Bucky repeated, and he exhaled sharply, a wet, horrible sound. He stumbled forward one step, then fell to his knees. It made it so much worse that he was so small, his skin white like ice and just as cold to the touch when Bucky grabbed his hand. His chest was stained red, still filthy, nobody had cleaned him. He had five bullet holes. Bucky screamed again, his throat raw and hoarse. The sound scraped out of him, dragging his insides out with it. He felt hollow. He felt like nothing. He felt dead.

Bucky leaned up as far as he could support himself, dropping his head next to Steve’s on the table. He looked like the man he had been for most of their lives. He looked like he was inside. Bucky pushed his blonde hair away from his face with his metal hand, his flesh hand still tangled in Steve’s stiff fingers. His eyes were open and staring, blue and faded and so empty, so much worse for the fact that Steve has _never_ looked like this. _Had_ never looked like this. Steve was dead. Steve was dead in front of him.

"Stevie," Bucky whispered, and it came out like dead air. He held tighter to his hand, imagined Steve was squeezing back. He wasn't. He wouldn't. 

God, Steve, _Steve Rogers,_ Steve was _dead_ under Bucky’s hands. Bucky slumped, his head on the table the only thing holding him up. His fingers threaded through Steve’s hair, and he hiccupped through his quick breathing.

“I love you,” Bucky promised.

“I love you,” Steve didn’t say.

The trial of Bucky Barnes was painstaking, revelatory, and painful like a blade. The edge was dull and ripped Bucky to shreds. Bucky had no idea how to handle it, how to handle losing all that he had in this world, all that he had ever had in this world. To see Steve’s lifeless face in front of him, to know, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that his reason for living was dead - it was horrible, like nothing else. He felt like he deserved it. Steve didn’t, though. Steve didn’t deserve this.

 

**Author's Note:**

> You can follow me on Twitter at [@nicoIodeon](https://twitter.com/nicoIodeon) or on Tumblr at [andillwriteyouatragedy](http://andillwriteyouatragedy.tumblr.com/).


End file.
